


In the Eye of the Beholder

by Delphi



Series: Love Is Blind [2]
Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: Adolescent Sexuality, Drama, Established Relationship, Guilt, Late at Night, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-04-16
Updated: 2004-04-16
Packaged: 2017-10-04 23:39:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/35329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Delphi/pseuds/Delphi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Summer approaches, bringing bittersweetness. Follows <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/35330">Blind, Deaf, and Dumb</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In the Eye of the Beholder

When the boy hadn't turned up by three o'clock in the morning, by half-three, by four, Argus Filch put on his nightclothes and put out the lamp and slid into bed alone. Mrs. Norris was mousing down in the kitchens. The sheets were cold. He lay for some time with his eyes open in the dark, wondering if tossing off would make him feel more like sleeping. He doubted it, but his cock gave a half-interested twitch at the offer.

He rolled onto his back, sighing, and had just dug his hand under the blankets when he heard the familiar click of the deadbolt. He paused. The doorknob slowly turned, and the door swung upon a crack, letting a sliver of dim light in from the corridor. A silhouette peeked its head in and, before Argus could say anything, slipped into the room, shutting the door quietly behind it.

Argus's heartbeat quickened, taking up like a bass drum in his throat, in his belly, in between his legs. He could hear the boy breathing. Could very nearly taste him. He wondered, if he stayed quiet, if young Snape would turn around and leave.

'Go away, little boy,' he thought. 'Fly away home.'

But the boy knew his way in the dark and didn't need Argus's say-so to tiptoe across the room to the foot of the bed. The madness of that shivered like a frightened mouse in the pit of his belly. For days and weeks, and then a month, he had scarcely dared to breathe, waiting in numb horror for that tap on his shoulder and somebody asking him just what he thought he was doing entertaining students in his room. Waiting for the words to be said. Waiting to be turned out into the street. Waiting for someone to try to tell him he'd _hurt_ the boy.

Only no one had come. No one ever came looking for this one, and if Argus had a lick of sense left, he would call a stop to it while he still had the chance.

It mightn't be too late, he thought. He could probably make the boy listen, if he laid it out gentle but firm. Told him he was a good lad, but that the time had come for him to take up with one of his own chums, or a pretty girl, so long as he didn't mean to get her in any trouble. He could tell him he was still plenty welcome to hang about, to come for a cup of tea and a willing ear, but no more of this...this...no more of this.

But he didn't. The words stuck in his throat, and all he could do was lie still and silent, knowing that it had gone too far for silence to mean anything but yes. And if he were being honest with himself, he would admit it was no accident that he never turned the charmed tumbler on his door anymore. As though the rusty old deadbolt were any match for a wand.

He heard the soft scuff of shoes and then a whispery rustle like robes falling to the floor. The waxy sound of bare feet on stone.

He held his breath.

The blankets lifted.

The mattress dipped, and he felt the boy clambering in beside him. Elbows, knees—cold feet pressing against his own. The boy's breath was hot against his shoulder, and he smelled strongly of pine soap. Argus reached out blindly, touching warm skin and hair still damp from the bath.

"Thought getting up early would be easier than staying up," the boy whispered.

A hand brushed against Argus's hip, then settled over his crotch. It pressed down gently, rubbing him through his nightshirt. Soft little strokes, shy like the boy had no right to be. Delicate fingers curled around him, and his cock stiffened up obligingly.

Argus stared up wide-eyed into nothingness, winding the sheets around his clenched fists and fighting to keep still as his nightshirt was pulled up.

The mattress shifted, and there was the sound he knew was a naked body rubbing against rough sheets. Then the blankets came down, and the scraggly ends of the boy's hair were tickling his bare belly.

A myriad of small noises suddenly jostled each other for space. Breathe, swallow, breathe. The soft smack of the boy getting his lips good and wet. Then Argus's eyes were drifting rapturously shut and a low, hungry sound sneaked out on a sigh.

Oh...but the boy had been a quick study.

"Clever," he whispered, as that hot mouth slid down over him, suckling like a babe at the breast.

He shivered. Sweet little kitten licks—lovely, filthy slurping sounds—made him itch to twine his fingers in the boy's hair and fuck his velvet mouth until it dribbled with cream, only he mustn't, oh how he mustn't.

Instead, his fingers stumbled down to the scruff of the boy's neck and squeezed helplessly while his other hand quested for the bedside lamp, fumbling with the wheel until a flame sprang up and the room came into soft orange focus.

The boy glared up at him, Argus's cock slipping wetly from his mouth. His dark eyes were red-rimmed and sleepy, squinting, and he was hunched over on his haunches like an animal, the curve of his spine making a smooth arc that led right down to the cleft between his cheeks. Argus reached out to pet him, his beardless cheek and razor-sharp shoulder blade, down the knobs of his spine to the end of his tailbone.

"C'mere," he muttered, without really having to because just a little pressure from his fingertips had the boy eagerly crawling up to share the pillow, eyes closed and lips pursed, and that was the worst of it because it was one thing to have a not-quite-sixteen year old boy coming to his bed begging to be licked and fondled and fucked...

He sighed.

...it was something else entirely to have him begging to be _kissed_. An upturned face and fluttering lashes and a mouth no less sharp than its words, but sometimes sharp was all right.

Argus turned onto his side, parting his lips for the boy's darting tongue, his nightshirt hiked up about his waist and his cock pointing straight out like a compass needle. The boy kissed in brisk little waves, like the salty sea lapping up against the rocks. Hands that clutched and teeth that nipped.

Argus softly moaned.

Yes...sometimes sharp was the very best.

He curved his hand around the boy's jaw, feeling the beat of his pulse. It quickened beneath his fingers, and their kiss took on an edge of urgency as the boy squirmed against him, hooking a leg over Argus's hip. Their bellies pressed together, and Argus tugged him even closer, his cock rubbing against smooth, warm skin. He could feel an answering twitch against his hip, and the boy lazily frotted against him for a minute before breaking the kiss and drawing back with a hitched breath.

"You're going to do it this time," he said, his eyes almost demurely downcast as he toyed with the little hairs on Argus's belly.

He didn't do innocent very well, young Snape. He only managed to look haughty, like a spoiled princeling who knew he was going to get his way. It would have been a mean look on anyone else, but there was a questioning lilt hiding at the end of his words, a nervous twitch of his mouth that gave him away.

Argus didn't say anything, and the boy frowned. Cool fingertips crept up under Argus's nightshirt, ghosting over his nipples.

"You will," he said, a familiar stubborn set to his brow. "You'll fuck me this time. I want you to."

This was punctuated with an insistent wriggle of his hips, and if Argus had ever had a good reason to say no, it was a lot harder to lay hands on in the small hours with the boy in his arms.

All he could do was spare a shudder for the thought of what would happen if the boy were to turn his eager body, so needy, so _hungry_, over to hands even more wrong than his own—if he were to go chasing one of the older Slytherins and ended up locker-room sport with his name smeared all over the school, or God forbid he got it in his head to take up with that lout Hagrid, who seemed to like the lad right enough but who'd likely tear him to pieces whether he meant to or not.

And as the boy began lightly scratching his back, he thought breathlessly of how he'd already put his greased-up fingers into that tight little hole on more than one night, and as they'd say in Hogsmeade town, just as well to be hanged for the boar as for the piglet.

He gathered him up close and breathed in the smell of him: soap and sweat, and the odd, musty scent of his hair. Closed his eyes and pushed his cock hard into the hollow of a bony hip.

"Yes," he whispered against the boy's brow. "Want you."

He did, oh how he did. He wanted him so badly that he ached. Wanted to remember him just like this—as he rolled the boy onto his back and laid him out—naked and open-armed, that little smirk curving his solemn mouth. He wanted to be able to remember, long after the boy had left him, what it had been like to have him on his elbows and knees, trembling. He wanted to be the first, the only, to claim these sweet, tender parts of him. Whatever was left of his innocence.

He kissed the boy and damned himself. "Need you."

The boy flushed.

Argus let him go to strip out of his nightshirt, quickly, shying away from those queer black eyes. He never could guess what was going on behind them, couldn't see anything in them save for his own sorry reflection. Naked, he leaned back over him, kissing his throat and chest and those dark little nipples that tightened right up in his mouth. He could see the boy's cock making a tent in the sheet, and it made him so hungry he shook, like he was starving, like he'd been too long without the drink. A wet line of kisses had him inching down the bed, a taut belly quivering under his lips, and then he was swallowing the boy down to a choked-off cry and hands grasping at his shoulders.

Salty and smooth, sliding into his mouth—he didn't think he could ever tire of sucking the boy off. Feeling that slim cock all warm and hard between his lips and drawing out every spurt of helpless, twitching pleasure while the boy squirmed and moaned. Made him feel like an artist, a maestro, a god, playing that young body for everything it was worth. It was the boy's own fault. He just made it so easy, giving himself up like he was no better than he was, pressing into touches just as fiercely when he was bare as he shied away from them clothed. And those rough little sounds he made...

"Ah..._please_."

Argus teased him with lips and tongue and teeth until the boy was stiff as a wand, then gave him one last hard suck before turning him over onto his belly, watching as he slithered like a snake, restlessly trying to get his cock settled against the mattress.

"Here now," Argus soothed, rubbing his shoulders, kneading the lean muscles until he earned a shuddery sigh.

He let his hands wander slowly down that whippet-lean body, over a knobbly backbone, digging firmly into those soft spots just under the boy's ribs. Such smooth skin, like vellum. It made Argus's hands feel coarse and common just to touch him. Made his mouth feel like a hungry animal's when he leaned down and licked the shallow dip at the small of the boy's back, dragging his tongue lower and lower until he reached that sweet curve of a cleft.

A shiver. Argus could see the patches of gooseflesh popping up at the tops of those milk-pale thighs. He got the boy's cheeks in his hands and gently spread them open, hearing a little whispered cry get muffled against the pillow. The sound of it made his own excitement sharpen, leading him to imagine just what sort of noises were going to trip from that sharp tongue when the boy was finally pierced. Would he whimper, the way he did when he was licked and sucked for so long he couldn't stand it—or would he gasp and groan, thrashing like a landed fish, the way he did when he had Argus's fingers inside him to the knuckles?

A little sigh, rushed and bashful, came when Argus ran a fingertip over that tight little pucker.

"Shh...have to get you ready," Argus murmured. "Have to make you nice and open for me."

The boy cried out at the first lick, glancing whiplash-quick over his shoulder, eyes wide.

"What are you...?"

Argus pressed harder with the second, drawing a long, wet stripe up to the tailbone, then a slow spiral with the tip of his tongue.

"...ohhh." The boy shuddered, burying his face back into the pillow with a gasp.

"Like that, do we?" Argus asked, and the boy's faint moan sent a hot shiver through him.

His cock was hard enough to drive nails, but he didn't dare touch himself, nor even rub against the bedclothes, knowing that if he started, he wouldn't be able to stop until he was stroking off all over that tempting arse and no good to anyone for the rest of the morning. Instead, he set to coaxing out every gasp and moan he could, teasing and slurping and sucking until the boy was open and wet and wriggling with the need of it.

He drew away just long enough to sit up and fumble in the nightstand for the tube of slick stuff. The boy lay still and trembling, face flushed and damp. His breathing quickened as Argus kissed his way back down his body to where he'd started, giving a few teasing licks before pushing the tip of his tongue inside.

The boy squawked, nearly lurching off the bed. "Oh, fuck!"

"Language," Argus chid, chuckling between flicks of his tongue. The boy's hands were moving restlessly through the bedding. "Tell me when you're about to shoot."

A moan. "Why?"

Argus held his hips down firmly, licking up the little droplets of sweat that were dripping down to the small of his back.

"So that..."

He made a suck-mark right on the cusp of one white cheek, and it resounded with a wet smack.

"...I know when to stop."

The boy looked wild-eyed over his shoulder, his bewilderment plain in a single tortured: "_Why?_"

"Because," Argus said, his cock now throbbing painfully as he drew back and looked at that pink little opening, wet and twitching. He greased two fingers and watched as the boy's hot body swallowed them right up. "I want to be inside you when you do."

He carefully worked in a third finger, lightly stroking over the magic spot inside and savouring the tender sigh as the boy thrust eagerly back.

"Would we like that, hm?" he murmured, slowly drawing his fingers out.

Oh yes, the boy's faint whimper said. Yes, we would.

His hands were trembling just a little as he slicked himself up. He made a quick job of it, certain that at this point a stiff breeze could send him spilling over. His gaze swept hungrily over the boy's body, wanting to commit every detail to memory, every angle and curve, his creamy skin in the lamplight, the strawberry smudge of a birthmark high on his thigh that nobody else had ever licked.

He remembered to breathe, and he gave the boy a sharp slap on the rump. "Get your legs up under you."

The boy arched up onto elbows and knees, and God, wasn't that an even prettier sight. Smooth thighs and a pert little backside and that sweet, secret place all slick and ready for him. He inched closer, one hand on his cock and the other holding the boy's hip.

And when he pressed forward—he squeezed his eyes shut—the sudden grip around him was nearly painful. He gasped but rode it out along with the boy's quiet hiccough, and a moment later was sliding in the rest of the way, easy as you please. He could feel his blood pounding like river rapids in his loins, tight little twitches around the root of his cock.

"All right?" he asked, his voice sounding fainter than he would have liked.

The boy was silent for a moment, breathing hard. Argus could see the fingers of one hand plucking at the sheets. But when his voice came, it was more thoughtful than pained.

"Don't...don't push down so much."

Argus's gaze immediately dropped to his hands, moulded to the boy's narrow hips. He wasn't pushing down at—

Oh.

It shouldn't have made him blush. For God's sake, he was bare-arsed and sweating, balls-deep in the boy, but he knew without seeing that young Snape was wearing a certain calculating frown, like when he was trying to puzzle out an arithmantic equation and something wasn't lining up right.

His voice snagged in his throat, caught between stuttering and laughing. "Move back on your elbows a bit..."

He pulled out a little, then slid slowly back in.

"...s'that better?"

"Ah!" A breathy sigh. "_Yes_."

"Good."

He began to move, hesitantly at first and then with more force as the dizzying sensation overtook him. It was like fucking kid leather, an unbearably keen pleasure that lay on the knife's edge between slick and friction. His hips were quick to take up a rhythm, and he _wanted_ to be gentle. When he'd imagined this, guiltily, in his secret, private thoughts, he'd imagined himself gentle and knowing and kind—everything a boy needed for his first time—but it was all getting jumbled up in his head now, replaced by nothing but need. It had been too long since he'd done this, more years than the boy had been walking, and that was only a whore who couldn't even pretend to like it.

He felt a sudden helpless fear at the hunger of his body, afraid that his clumsiness was making him claw at the boy when he meant to caress, push where he meant to guide. There didn't seem to be any protest, though. The boy kept making these sounds, so arousing that it hurt just to listen to them, wretched little wanting sounds. So tight. Argus felt the last threads of his control unravel in his hands, and he gave in to the urge to take his pleasure in earnest. Long, smooth strokes that felt like sweet, slow torture.

"Sss..." he hissed, lost in the moans and whimpers and the sharp sound of their bodies driving together.

He got his hand around the boy's cock. It was hard as iron, needing only a few hard rubs before the boy was clawing at the sheets, spending himself with a breathless moan. Warm cream spurted onto Argus's fingers, and he brought them to his lips, licking up every drop.

After that, there was nothing that could make him go slowly. He fell into a driving rhythm, unable to get deep enough, close enough. Even spent, the boy kept moaning low and soft, arching his back like a randy cat.

"Don't stop."

The whisper came so quietly that Argus barely heard it, and it was ridiculous anyway. He couldn't stop himself if wanted to. He had told himself that he could, would if the boy needed him to, but the boy was nothing but a wicked tease, pushing back on him like a trained whore, like a galleon-mouthed fancy boy, and it wasn't fair that he be such a precious lad under all that bitter gall and wantonness.

'Don't stop,' he thought as the pleasure overtook him. 'Don't stop.'

He yanked the boy's hips back against his own, holding him tight as his release shuddered through him. A ragged moan tore from his throat.

"My..." He bit his tongue, even before he knew what he was going to say. My stars, my God, my boy.

They stayed locked and trembling together for a handful of heartbeats until Argus came down enough to realise he would likely collapse right on top of the boy in a moment. He pulled out carefully, replacing his cock with two fingers, then one, feeling the slick mess of grease and spunk and letting the boy tighten down around him. He eased him back down onto his belly and took a good look at him. He looked well-fucked, but there was no blood. Just one limp young man stretching out and curling his toes, his stomach giving a quiet gurgle. Breathing heavy but slow. No sign of moving in the near future.

Argus rolled off the bed with some effort, snatching his trousers off the floor and making his way to the bathroom on unsteady legs. He closed the door only partway behind him, keeping the boy centred in a sliver of the mirror. He splashed some lukewarm water on his face and washed the sticky mess off his cock. Then he pulled on his trousers, set the water to hot, and scrubbed his hands until they were red.

In the mirror, he saw the boy roll over onto his back. His eyes were closed, his lips faintly curled into something that was neither a smile nor a sneer, but wholly satisfied. He looked...well, he looked almost pretty with the colour in his cheeks like that, though most might not credit it. It made him wonder what the boy was going to look like when he was a man. If this graceful part of him would be naked for everyone to see once the rest of his hunch-shouldered awkwardness was whittled away.

It gave him a funny turn. He didn't know how he felt about everyone else seeing what he saw, even if he'd been the first.

Next time, he thought feverishly, next time he was going to take the boy on his back, legs spread. And then the next time, on his side, curled close around him. And the time after that, maybe he'd let the boy have a go on top, being the man, like.

His cock was too tired to stir, but his belly had a pleasant flutter for the thought of the boy's skinny arms planted on either side of him, face flushed, narrow chest heaving.

He frowned suddenly, counting the rest of the school days off on his fingers. His fists clenched as though he could hold them there. There were only so many next times left. The OWLs were coming up, and then summer, and the boy was going home, going to work full time in his uncle's apothecary this year. It would do him good, teach him some responsibility. He would come back grown up a little more—they all did their growing over the summers—and who could say where he'd be spending his time after that.

It hurt. He knew that it shouldn't, but he couldn't help it. Children came and children went. For thirty years, he'd watched them pass through these halls and out into the wizarding world where they belonged. So many children, every year. He'd watched them all. And he found himself thinking, surely the world wouldn't miss just one, just this once.

He thought it would only be fair. If he got to keep just one for himself.

The boy was lightly dozing by the time he came back into the bedroom. Argus was tempted to join him. He'd been up all night, and nothing looked better than pulling the covers over the both of them and sleeping the Saturday away. But he pulled on his boots instead and did his coat up over his bare chest. He slipped out the door, taking care to shut it nearly silently behind him.

Sleep could hold on a while longer. The castle would be quiet for a few hours yet, but the sun was lurking somewhere just under the horizon. He turned his feet towards the kitchens.

Growing boys needed their breakfast.


End file.
